Suggested sources of information on Prospect Park and its place in the history of American architecture and landscape design. (Some of these titles are only available through used book sellers and the public library.)

Prospect Park Guides

Barnes & Noble Complete Illustrated Guidebook to Prospect Park and the Brooklyn Botanic Garden
Richard J. Berenson
2001, Silver Lining Books

Central Park/Prospect Park
M.M. Graff
1985, Greensward Foundation

Prospect Park Handbook
Clay Lancaster
1972, Greensward Foundation

Biographies of Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux

Genius of Place: The Life of Frederick Law Olmsted
Justin Martin
2011, Da Capo Press

A Clearing in the Distance: Frederick Law Olmsted and America in the Nineteenth Century
Witold Rybczynski
1999, Scribner

FLO – A Biography of Frederick Law Olmsted
Laura Wood Roper
1973, The Johns Hopkins University Press

Frederick Law Olmsted: Designing the American Landscape
Charles Beveridge and Paul Rocheleau
1998, Universe

Park Maker: A Life of Frederick Law Olmsted
Elizabeth Stevenson
1999, Transaction Publishers

Calvert Vaux: Architect & Planner
William Alex
1994, Ink, Inc.

Country, Park & City: The Architecture and Life of Calvert Vaux
Francis R. Kowsky
1998, Oxford University Press

Writings of Olmsted and Vaux
The Papers of Frederick Law Olmsted
Various editors
The Johns Hopkins University Press
Volume I – The Formative Years 1822-1852
Volume II – Slavery and the South 1852-1857
Volume III – Creating Central Park 1857-1861
Volume IV – Defending the Union
The Civil War and the U.S. Sanitary Commission 1861-1863
Volume V – The California Frontier 1863-1865
Volume VI – The Years of Olmsted, Vaux & Company 1865-1874

The Papers of Frederick Law Olmsted
Supplementary Series Volume I – Writings on Public Parks, Parkways and Park Systems
Charles E. Beveridge and Carolyn F. Hoffman, Editors
1997, The Johns Hopkins University Press


Landscape Architecture
Apostle of Taste: Andrew Jackson Downing, 1815-1852 (Creating the North American Landscape)
David Schuyler
1996, The Johns Hopkins University Press

The New Urban Landscape: The Redefinition of City Form in Nineteenth-Century America
David Schuyler
1986, The Johns Hopkins University Press